Los Angeles port officials said Monday that a ship collided with the Vincent Thomas Bridge over the weekend because an onboard crane was left extended -- not because the bridge was too low. They said they were more concerned about the potential for problems as truck traffic on the bridge increases.

The fate of thousands of Mazda Motor Corp. cars was uncertain after the ship carrying them to North America rolled over on its side in the northern Pacific near Alaska's Aleutian Islands. The Japanese automaker had 4,700 vehicles aboard the Cougar Ace, which began taking on water Sunday and listed so heavily that the 23-member crew had to be rescued Monday by the U.S. Coast Guard. The shipment is fully insured against loss, Mazda said.

On the morning his glass-bottom boat gave a final groan and then sunk in the Pacific Ocean, Rick Parker could only watch from 25 yards away as the unimaginable happened. It had all been a big adventure that he was sure would have a happy ending. A restaurateur in Martinez in Northern California, Parker, 55, wanted a boat as a second restaurant in the town harbor. In April 2005, he found the one he wanted: a 109-foot paddle-wheeler built in 1929 and launched in 1931.

A man was rescued Friday when his 50-foot wooden sailboat sank about two miles south of the San Clemente pier, officials said. Michael Scholefield, who lives aboard the vessel, was not injured, said Nicola Lesourd, a U.S. Coast Guard operations specialist. He had left Newport Beach and was heading toward Mexico, officials said. The white boat, named Greyhound, sank about 6:45 a.m. near San Mateo Point after striking rocks, Lesourd said.

Searchers using sonar early Tuesday located the body of a man who had fallen out of a kayak while paddling with his father in Newport Dunes Aquatic Park. Police said Richard Diffee, 30, of Costa Mesa apparently suffered a seizure, stood up and then fell overboard Monday night. Diffee's father dived into the water but was unable to find him.

It took a good 800 feet of water to separate Rick Parker from his dream of turning a historic glass-bottom boat into a Cajun eatery. City officials in Martinez had rejected the idea. They noted that their dilapidated marina near San Francisco Bay had some of the murkiest water in the state and therefore perhaps one of the worst sites for a glass-bottom boat.

Rescue crews searched the Chesapeake Bay for a publisher and former diplomat Sunday after his sailboat was discovered empty in the water with the engine still running. The Coast Guard dispatched a C-130 aircraft, a helicopter and boats to assist in the search for 72-year-old Philip Merrill, who had been sailing alone Saturday. Senior Chief Steve Carleton said the Coast Guard was operating under the assumption that Merrill fell overboard.

The Phoenix, a 100-foot glass-bottomed paddleboat, sank Sunday morning off the coast of Malibu, authorities said. A restaurateur from the Bay Area recently bought the Phoenix and hoped to transform it into a floating Cajun eatery, said Mickey Gallagher, chief of the Los Angeles County Fire Department's rescue boat section.

A U.S. Coast Guard helicopter rescued a man who fell off a disabled 29-foot sailboat Tuesday and spent several hours in the ocean about 35 miles off Point Reyes National Seashore. The unidentified man was in critical condition at Stanford University Medical Center, Coast Guard Lt. John Fu said. The nature of his injuries was unclear.

Two men were killed Sunday when their boat struck the breakwater off the Port of Los Angeles and capsized, authorities said. A 7-year-old boy injured in the incident was on a ventilator and was expected to survive. The men were among six relatives who embarked on a fishing trip Sunday morning from Cabrillo Beach on an 18-foot motorboat, said Los Angeles Port Police Sgt. Daniel Aleman.